


pages turn and stick to each other

by amessofgaywords



Category: The Haunting of Bly Manor (TV)
Genre: F/F, Pre-Relationship, as in it is literally just that song, but not actually, dani is kind of a ghost, heavily inspired by right where you left me by taylor swift, in fic form, jamie is way too trusting of apparent ghosts, magical realism?, speaking of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-14 13:49:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28671792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amessofgaywords/pseuds/amessofgaywords
Summary: “Sucks, when they don’t take up the offer to go Dutch.” That might, Jamie thinks, might be her worst ever opening line. The woman looks up at her with empty, almost lifeless eyes. This close, Jamie can see her hair glitters in the low light, covered in a fine layer of dust.“You can see me?”or jamie finds an abandoned dani at a table at a batter place, and bonding ensues.
Relationships: Dani Clayton/Jamie
Comments: 12
Kudos: 115





	1. step one, dessert first

**Author's Note:**

> full disclosure: i don't know what this is. i have been listening to right where you left me a lot lately, and this just sort of came out. it's a spiritual successor to *when everything feels like the movies* in that i bend the laws of reality to be what i want them to be but they don't actually take place in the same universe. 
> 
> title from right where you left me by taylor swift.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m sorry, Eddie. I just can’t keep… I can’t keep doing this anymore.”

“What? Being happy?”

“I’m not happy, Eddie. I’m just not. There’s something that isn’t there- with you. That I don’t think… has ever been there. I’m sorry, Eddie. I’m so, so sorry.”

“Fuck you, Danielle.”

\---

“I mean, you’re just really closed off.” If Jamie had a dollar for every time a girl said that to her… okay, she’d have maybe four dollars. That’s still a lot of times, for a relatively short life and a relatively complicated sentiment. “And I think you’re great, but you’re just really hard to get to know, James.” Jamie does not like being called _James._ “I don’t know, I think this is for the best.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.” Isabelle smiles and Jamie resists the urge to mention Lisa, the girl Isabelle has been texting who has _known her since childhood._ “Do you wanna… I’ll take the bill.”

“No, it’s okay.” Isabelle stands up, gathering her purse and coat. As her long, long legs in her short, short skirt are suddenly put on display, Jamie is reminded again of a gazelle. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and probably Lisa will enjoy it, but it is a comparison she’s made. Isabelle smooths down the front of her dress and smiles a smile so saccharine Jamie’s tempted to skip dessert. “You can stay a little longer and I’ll tell the bartender guy to put it on my tab.”

Jamie knows the _bartender guy_ who also happens to be her boss’ son, but she lets this slide. “Yeah, sure. Be well, yeah? Sorry that it… ended like this.”

“You’re all good.” Isabelle steps forward, leaning down to press a kiss to Jamie’s cheek that probably leaves a purple lipstick mark. “See you around.” Isabelle disappears behind Jamie, out into the night, likely never to be seen again, unless… Jamie will just switch around her pub-hopping for a bit. Just in case.

So now here she is, in her nicest plaid pants and suspenders, all alone at a table for two. She flags down Rebecca. “Can you tell Owen to come here when he gets a chance? And bring a custard tart as well.”

Rebecca nods, notes the empty seat across from Jamie, doesn’t say anything. “He’s working on a lavender and gooseberry flavor.”

“Sounds delightful.” Anything Owen makes is such. Rebecca winks, gives Jamie’s shoulder a squeeze, and bops off to the kitchen to find Owen. Lovely, that one. It’ll be a shame when some lawyer snatches her genius up and out of here to work for them. Jamie doesn’t particularly mind her company.

Now alone at a table in the dark, romantic portion of her best friend’s restaurant, Jamie toys with the napkin in front of her, casts her eyes around. Everyone is eating, or drinking, or talking. Most of the tables are occupied with the Saturday night crowd. Just one, away in the corner with low candlelight and not a drink or meal in sight, is similarly lonely like Jamie is.

A girl is sitting there. Scratch that, looks about Jamie’s age, maybe late twenties, early thirties. She’s wearing a light floral dress in pinks and whites, cinched around the waist with a thin belt, and the daintiest little cardigan Jamie’s ever seen. Her hair is in a blowout, pinned back from her face by a delicate barrette. Her clothes scream _fragile._ Her shoulders are set and her jaw is clenched and her body is tense; she screams _strong._ Stronger, maybe, than she realizes. She’s not looking anywhere in particular, and her fingers are tapping out a rhythm on the tablecloth.

Jamie is not technically an employee of A Batter Place, but everyone she knows works here, so she’d like to consider herself an honorary waitress. Owen will find her when he needs to; it’s risotto night anyway and he’s likely swamped. Jamie’s on the cusp of thirty and freshly single and might as well. 

She takes her wine glass in one hand and strides over. The woman barely notices her presence. 

“Sucks, when they don’t take up the offer to go Dutch.” That might, Jamie thinks, might be her worst ever opening line. The woman looks up at her with empty, almost lifeless eyes. This close, Jamie can see her hair glitters in the low light, covered in a fine layer of dust.

“You can see me?”

Okay, so maybe Jamie failed the opening line, but that comeback was like swinging for left field and sending it crashing into the dugout. Unless alarmingly perplexing was what Blondie was going for, in which case…

“Think everyone can see you, love. Can ya see her?” Jamie asks the man seated to Blondie’s right, at his own table with his own date. He turns around in his chair.

“Yeah. Evening,” he says to Blondie. She raises her hand in response, wide-eyed, and he goes back to his meal.

Jamie pulls out the chair on the opposite side of Blondie and waits. When there’s no objection, she sits, leaning back casually and taking a sip of her wine. “That clear it up for you?”

“I just… I’ve been here so long.” Her voice is scratchy with disuse. The woman reaches up and fiddles with a charm hanging around her neck. A closed umbrella, topped with a little parrot head. Jamie makes a mental note – Blondie nickname has officially been switched to Poppins.

“What, were you stiffed or something?” Poppins makes a face, maybe like she isn’t quite sure what the words mean. Jamie scans the table. There’s no check, there’s no residue of dishes or glasses or anything but dust collecting on the centerpiece and the base of the lightly flickering candle. Like maybe Poppins _has_ been here for a while.

The woman smiles ruefully. “Uh, kinda. It’s been… jeez, I think it’s been a year. A year, at least.” She sighs, glances around. “I stopped counting. I just got used to… sitting here, you know?”

Jamie does not know. Not at all. She’s never sat in one place for a year, just staring, gathering dust, waiting to become useful for somebody. She’s spent most of her life avoiding that exact fate. She does her very best to make sure her usefulness doesn’t expire, that people don’t need her for superficial things but very real things like busted pipes and spring plots. That is how you keep moving, Jamie has always thought, and now: faced with living proof.

Poppins whirls on Jamie so suddenly it’s like she’s just remembered she’s there. “You think I’m crazy?”

Jamie looks around at the back corner of A Batter Place, by no means purgatory but somewhat disorienting all the same. Chattering, happy couples and the mostly-dried tear stains on Poppins’ cheeks. She clicks her tongue. 

“I think you’re surprisingly sane, considering.”

Poppins reaches out a hand.

“I’m Dani.”

“Jamie.” Someone clears their throat over Jamie’s shoulder. “Ah, what’s this, then?”

“ _Somebody_ ordered a custard tart and the compliments of the chef, if my _sour_ -ces are correct,” Owen smiles, a glint in his eye and a twitch in his mustache: the _most_ insufferable. “Met our resident patron, then?”

Dani furrows her brow at Owen. “You can see me too?”

“I think we cleared up that everyone can see you, Poppins.” Jamie accepts her custard tart with eager hands, and when Owen presents Dani with a spoon with a flourish, she just gestures to the dish with a free hand. “And if you’ve been here a year Owen’s bound to have come across you once or twice.”

Owen taps the table twice with his fingertips. “Right I have. Didn’t want to bother you while you processed, though. You seemed awfully pre- _octo_ - _fried_ over here.” He shakes his head with a grimace. “I’m working on calamari puns.”

“That one doesn’t stick.”

“Yeah, I didn’t think so.” Jamie watches them talk, sucking at her spoon. The more people interact with Dani, the wider her eyes go, the more she opens up, the more Jamie realizes how pretty she is. Underneath the carefully built walls of pastel pink she’s got a defiance to her, the kind Jamie sees looking back in the mirror more than often. And she’s got a softness, too. A gentleness, and a protective streak in the flashes of those sky-blue eyes. Something like stubborn. Jamie, Jamie knows stubborn well.

Dani digs her spoon into the opposite end of the tart from Jamie and takes a generous bite, moaning around the shape of the spoon in her mouth. “Wow. That’s very good.”

“I’m glad _someone_ is vocal about my talents,” Owen elbows Jamie in the side. She grumbles at him in response. “Speaking of. What did you need me for?”

“Can’t I just want to see my _very_ talented best friend?” The look on Owen’s face says that excuse doesn’t work anymore. “Fine. Isabelle broke up with me.”

Owen’s face takes on a sympathetic bent. Dani’s goes through surprise, confusion, sadness, guilt, and curiosity all at once. Jamie leans closer to the devil she knows. “S’fine, it was mutual,” she says to Owen, waving away his concern. “Didn’t work well. Wasn’t comfortable, no big.”

“There are other girls,” Owen says, and Jamie repeats the sentiment, currently debating the legality of marrying a custard tart. With the rate her love life is going, might be the best option out there.

“I’m sorry,” Dani chimes in after a second of silence. “I mean, breakups are hard. Well, I’ve only had one, but… I know they’re hard.”

“Bloke who left you here on your lonesome?” Jamie guesses. Owen pats her on the shoulder and slinks off to the kitchen again, but Dani’s eyes are glued to the table.

“Something like that.” Dani casts her eyes around, but there aren’t any ghosts here, at least none Jamie can see. Maybe Dani’s different. Maybe there’s a ghost in the mirror on the wall in the corner, in the candlelight flickering between them. Maybe Dani keeps her ghosts around for longer than Jamie. And maybe if they’re throwing bones in the fire Jamie should be the one to start.

“Izzy and I dated for about three months. She was sweet. Super trusting and a little flaky but nice to be around.” Jamie shrugs. “Just never… clicked. She was great. It just didn’t click.”

“It didn’t click for me either.” Dani leans in like she’s sharing a secret, her tone hushed, relief seeping into her words. “Eddie and I had been together since we were little, like really little, and I thought it would… make sense, but it never. It never made sense.” Dani shakes her head, like disbelief. “It never clicked with him, and I tried to tell him and he got angry with me. He walked away and I… stayed.”

Jamie glances around. “There are worst places to stay.”

The slow sadness that had been filling Dani’s eyes dissipates, just slightly. “Guess so.”

“I mean, to be trapped in a McDonald’s for eternity… Jesus. Or an Aldi, heaven forbid.” That gets a stammering laugh out of her. Dani claps a hand over her mouth, like it’s surprised her. “A Batter Place is good. Got good management.”

“Yeah, I can see that. So… how long have you known the chef here?”

There is something, Jamie thinks, about having a perfectly normal get-to-know-you conversation with someone you’ve met not twenty minutes ago, who’s been trapped in a hole in time for the past year. Dani seems a little startled with the ease of it as well. Every word out of her mouth is a surprise, every shared detail and elicited chuckle, making her eyes sparkle just that slightest bit more. By the time they’re on the topic of childhoods, Dani’s almost looking all the way alive.

And it isn’t Jamie’s fault if she moves her chair to be next to Dani halfway through a conversation on the finer parts of Sylvia Plath. It isn’t her fault if she asks for a second custard tart just to watch the way Dani’s eyes light up when the gooseberry flavor hits her tongue. “It’s been so long since I tasted something,” she confides to Jamie in low tones. This feels like a private something, a blooming something, like the best and most beautiful flowers in Jamie’s garden. The rusty watering can on her tool belt with the spout taped over feels like a weight, a reminder. _Maybe this time. If only._

It’s only when Miles comes over, bored look on his face, to remind them closing time is soon and also he won’t be giving Jamie any more wine, when the bubble starts to break. Dani’s features close off and the hope that had been lifting her shoulders starts to deflate.

Jamie clears her throat and pushes her third wine glass away. “If I don’t go check on my plant babies they might start to think I’ve abandoned them.” It’s a subtle hint. “They’re friendly about new people.” A less subtle hint. Offered like an olive branch across a not-so-impassable distance. Dani’s mouth opens and closes, confusion hinting across her face.

“I would love to- I don’t… I mean, I don’t know if I can-”

“You’re not gonna know if you don’t do anything about it.” Jamie is standing now, and offering a hand. A hand that is little more than meant to pull up a one-night kindred spirit, someone who fascinates her, a pretty girl who could be something more with time and water and sun and care taken. Jamie doesn’t consider herself someone all that good at _saving people,_ but Dani is different, already, and maybe if Jamie looks at that too long she’ll figure out why.

While she’s tugging on her coat, Dani stands. While she’s sorting out the bill and chucking cash on the table, Dani fingers the edges of a light jacket. “It was April when we came in,” she offers when Jamie eyes it warily.

“Just have to keep you warm myself, then,” she mutters, swinging an arm over Dani’s shoulders and pulling her into the considerable warmth of her Carhartt. Dani shivers anyway.

Past Dani’s purgatory table, now full of one night’s dessert and drinks and the shells of them that didn’t know each other. Past Jamie’s table, cleaned off and home to Rebecca’s rack of dirty dishes. She waves as they pass. Past Miles, at the bar, corking wine and cleaning glasses. Out the door and onto the London streets.

Dani shivers. “It’s cold out here.”

“It’s January,” Jamie reminds her. “Do you… I mean, I can take you to the greenhouse, or I can take you home.”

Once again, Jamie is reminded of what lies under Dani’s light dress and cardigan. There’s a shining steel resolve in her eyes when she leans in close, says “I want to see your flowers, though.”

“Okay, then.” Jamie starts down the street and doesn’t mind the way Dani’s feet trip her up on the walk.


	2. step two, a night blossoming

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this is... back. i kind of like this universe, and i had an idea for a follow-up, so it's turned into a thing now. this is going to be the kind of fic i update whenever i really feel like it, so it's not bound to be consistent. but hopefully it will be cute.

Jamie, as they walk, is holding her hand. Linking their fingers together and every so often absentmindedly swiping her thumb across Dani’s dry and dusty knuckles. It feels like when she stuck her fingers in the flame of the candle on the dinner table just to feel something, anything. This feels better than that.

“So,” Jamie says. “My greenhouse, s’not far. It’s down the block by The Cheshire. You know that place?” Dani shakes her head. “Right. Tourist. My bad. Yeah, ‘s uh… it’s good. Good pastries.” Jamie seems to be getting nervous the longer they walk, her steps shortening, her lips twisting.

“As good as Owen’s?” Dani asks softly. Jamie cracks the slightest of smiles.

“Never. But if you tell him that he’ll get a big head.” Dani picks up the pace a little bit. Steps lightly, swings her and Jamie’s combined hands back and forth. Maybe to get a little bit of feeling back in her legs. Maybe to tell her, _it’s fine, I’m nervous too._ Dani hasn’t been on a first date in how-many years. 

Hmm. The air smells nice. Sweet. Smells, like something, like what Dani hasn’t been able to grasp in a long, long time. Fresh. And there is cool air on her skin, even if it’s a little too cold, even if she shivers. Jamie’s a weight by her side anyway. An every-so-often weight that leans in, like it’s trying to judge if Dani’s still there, disappeared or not. _Still here,_ Dani leans back, _still walking._

“So the greenhouse is where you work?” Dani aims to make pleasant conversation so Jamie feels more comfortable, which is a gentle turn of the table from how this all started. Jamie approaching gently, like to a startled animal, and coaxing Dani into the light- the moonlight, maybe, of a new world. And now, as reality settles into the crevices, Dani is thrown into her instinctual role of caregiver. Her mission: make Jamie feel safe. Hopefully, if all allows, keep her close.

She’s only had her a few hours, but if anything happened to Jamie, Dani might freeze all over again.

Jamie nods, hiding a sniff behind the collar of her jacket. Her cheeks are pink. _She’s cold,_ Dani thinks. _It’s cute,_ Dani thinks.

“I could’ve gotten a shopfront or somethin’ or maybe an office… but it felt better, being surrounded by the plants. Not the office type anyway. Started a landscaping business so I could get my hands dirty, makes no sense to…”

“Bury them in paperwork instead?” Dani finishes. Jamie laughs lightly.

“S’pose.” They turn the corner to face a slightly less crammed-up street, a low row of brick buildings. A pub, a restaurant, a convenience store, and a small green door with a gold _314_ hanging from it. Jamie fishes a ring of keys out of her pocket. “What about you, Poppins?” she asks, fiddling with the lock.

Dani tucks her hands into the sleeves of the sweater as a gust of wind blows past. “Oh, you know. I kill most of the plants I touch.”

“Maybe I shouldn’t be bringin’ you in here,” Jamie jokes, glancing back over her shoulder at Dani with shining eyes. “I meant… what do you do? Don’t strike me as the hands-on type.”

“Oh, I’m plenty hands-on,” Dani chuckles. “I’m a teacher. Fourth grade.”

“The little tykes?”

“Well… yeah, I guess. Most of them are around nine, and plenty messy, so I know a bit about hands-on, that’s… what I meant.” Jamie finally gets the lock to open. Dani hears a muttered _hell yeah_ and holds back a snort as Jamie kicks the door open with one boot, revealing a dark interior. “Should I…”

“After you,” Jamie gestures, stepping in behind Dani to pull the door closed with a resounding thud. The metal doesn’t block out all of the city noises outside, but they’re muffled. Makes Dani feel like she’s stepped into another world. A sweet smelling one, a little humid, dark and full of possibility.

Jamie flicks a light, and the room comes into focus. It’s simple, just a reception room. Two dated green couches surround a weathered coffee table with more than a few mug stains. Paintings hang on the wall, most of them ornately framed, and a record player with stacks of records rests in the corner. There’s a counter with an old-looking landline and a mess of contracts, receipts, and dried-out pens. At the back of the room is a large green door, windows on either side looking out to a greenhouse absolutely covered in plants. Dani sees a slight hallway behind the counter, a staircase just barely visible.

“I live above,” Jamie explains. “Come on.”

She beckons Dani to the greenhouse door, puts all of her weight into the push. She holds the door open for Dani to enter, and oh. 

Life. So much more than Dani’s felt in ages. The room bursts at the seams from it. Life in blooms and branches and vines, dripping from the ceiling to tickle at Dani’s cheeks and reaching out to clasp her ankles. The greenhouse is alive with a bit of magic and a bit of Jamie, who moves through it like she was born here, in the dirt, among the green.

Jamie shucks off her heavy coat, and Dani follows suit with her sweater, even though it’s thin. It’s warm in here, as a greenhouse should be, and the way Jamie regards Dani lights something under her skin like the warm press of a flashlight close to your face, giggling with a friend under the blanket after lights-out and hoping the adults don’t hear.

“It’s… it’s beautiful in here, Jamie.” Beautiful doesn’t even cut it, but there’s nothing else Dani can say.

“I do my best.” Jamie rocks back and forth on her heels. “You ‘ave any… particular favorites? I grow a bit here, sell some wholesale. I could…”

“I like wildflowers.” Dani cuts her off. “Well, all flowers are pretty. But I like wildflowers a lot. They’re… enchanting.”

Jamie cocks her head, and just looks for a long moment. Dani raises an eyebrow, and she clears her throat, awkwardly. “Right. Well, s’difficult to get them to grow in here, being wild and all.” Jamie smiles, and gestures with her arms out. “But if it’s enchantment you’re after, I’ve got plenty for that.”

And so Jamie gives Dani the tour. The greenhouse is organized based on needs, much more meticulously maintained than the counter in the front room. Green plants bask in sunlight-heavy areas, and Jamie shows off the sprinkler system (“took me ages to rig, the bastard.”) She cuts a lily with such precision, gentleness, and tucks it into Dani’s hair. “Like a woodland princess,” she says. Dani rolls her eyes.

“Not likely.”

“Plenty likely.”

“Shut up, please.”

“Alright.”

“What are these?” Mostly to change the topic of conversation, Dani points at a patch of purplish flowers, crowded onto a workbench.

“Those are peonies. Wretched, finnicky little things but they’re very interesting plants.” Jamie leans against the workbench with her arms crossed. Dani mirrors the image, raising her eyebrows in a challenge.

“Oh?”

“You familiar with the language of flowers?” Jamie smirks. Smirks harder when Dani shakes her head. “S’the way florists, plant people, really, classify flowers. Their meanings, you could say. Peonies have many. Sometimes contradicting, it’s true. For example:” Jamie snips a bloom with a flourish and holds it in her hand. “This bad boy could mean shame, romance, wealth, ostentation, and anger. All in one.”

“Jeez.” Dani blows a strand of hair out of her face. “Has anyone ever needed a flower to say that many things?”

“It’s also regarded as an aphrodisiac,” Jamie adds, oh so helpfully. “Could mean gay life, too.”

Dani snorts. Jamie’s stoic face breaks.

“I was hoping that one would get you.”

“It did.” Dani sighs, reaching out. Jamie hands the bloom to her, and she strokes the petals gently. “Do you just… have all that memorized?”

“Well, I do a bit of studying. I have a book and everything.” Jamie gestures with her thumb out to the front room. “If you were ever interested, I’ve heard I’m an excellent teacher.”

“Are you now?” Dani’s breath catches when she realizes Jamie has stepped closer. 

“Like I said.” Jamie’s hand comes out, cups Dani’s, her eyes lighting on the motion of Dani’s fingers on the flower petal. “I’ve been told.”

A moment of quiet. Peace. Nothing. Not the kind of nothing Dani felt sitting in one place for a year, but the kind of nothing that comes with a kindred person, the kind of person who doesn’t ask more out of you than they know you’re willing to give. Who doesn’t ask anything at all, maybe; who in fact brings you to a greenhouse in the middle of the night just to say _look at me and I won’t shy away._

Dani, ever one to return the favor: “I never had anything like this I cared about in my life.”

“You care about your kids.” Jamie is still so close, making no moves to back away. “Kids you teach, I mean.”

“But they move on.” Dani speaks quietly. This is not a moment to be broken. “They grow up and leave and then I teach a new group. I can help them, maybe, but… it isn’t much.”

Jamie covers Dani’s hand with her own, crushing the peony between them. “Plants are just like that,” she whispers. “Give ‘em all you can, and then they leave you. Have to, in the end.” Jamie removes her hand, and the petal sits, crushed, mousetrap-past heavy, between them. “But you give them what you can while they’re here.”

“That’s beautiful,” Dani says. So quiet she almost doesn’t hear it.

Jamie steps away, a light in her eyes, however dim, like a single lamp in a warm bedroom. “Dani?” she asks.

“Hmm?” Dani fingers the crushed petal, rubbing the softness of it into her skin. Wondering if Jamie’s skin, the parts not marked by dirt-life and scars, feels a little like this.

“Do you have a place to go home to?”

Dani looks up. Jamie leans against the workbench, tapping her fingers on the wood, legs crossed over each other. “We were staying at a hotel,” Dani says. “We… me and Eddie were staying at a hotel. By the airport. But he’s left by now, probably, and… I don’t want to go there, where he is. I don’t… have… I mean, it’s been a year.”

“It has.” Jamie chews on her bottom lip. “D’ya want me to drive you somewhere?”

Dani looks around at the life here. Spots an overstuffed couch tucked back amongst a few potted trees. “Could I sleep in here?” Jamie’s eyes widen. “Just.. for the night. I want to stay- stay here a little while longer.”

Jamie reaches out a hand, catching Dani’s fidgeting hands in her own. “I could get you some sleep clothes from upstairs.”

“That… would be good.”

Jamie retreats without another word, leaving a phantom squeeze resonating in Dani’s hands and life blossoming around her, new and not still at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alternate title: jamie gets dumped and decides to adopt a pretty american greenhouse cryptid.
> 
> honestly, at this point, even i don't know if dani is human. we're going to have to wait and see on that one.

**Author's Note:**

> i took the lyrics of this song very literally. she is actually covered in dust, folks.
> 
> this was fun. if you want more... let me know, i guess? i don't really know what's happening here but neither does jamie and she usually just figures it out as she goes along.
> 
> come yell at me @amessofgaywords on twitter.


End file.
